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Beyond Illustration Illuminatiotts of the P Hotographic "Frontier" Carol J

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Beyond Illustration Illuminatiotts of the P Hotographic Williams: Beyond lllustration: Illuminations of the Photographic "Frontier" JOW, Spring 2007, Vol. 46, No.2 - 29 Beyond Illustration Illuminatiotts of the P hotographic "Frontier" Carol J. Williams HOTOGRAPHS promise a luminous doorway For what purpose was the photograph produced at into history, but only through systematic contex- what Roland Barthes calls the "point of transmis- tual interpretation will riches be excavated. Like sion"?3 other primary resources, such as personal diaries What, in your estimate, might have been the intent of or letters, photographs require systematic analysis to the photographer, or subject, in taking the image? reveal full their potential. Consider Laurel Thatcher Has the meaning, or intention, changed as the photo- Ulrich's historical interpretation of the life and labor of graph has circulated among users and over time? an eighteenth-century midwife derived from Martha This essay considers three genres of photographs Ballard's diary. Ballard's diary seemed so spare that landscape, portraiture, and images of "Indian life."- I earlier researchers failed to detect its value.'Yet Thatch- draw on my research on photography in the Pacific er Ulrich artfully teased out myriad intersecting social Northwest to demonstrate an interpretative method use- histories, relationships, characters, maps, criminal acts, ful for researchers, teachers, and students alike. Theories and interpersonal antagonisms. and methods from an interdisciplinary affay of scholars, So too photographs. As Shawn Michelle Smith re- including Roland Barthes, John Collier, Catherine A. cently noted in her analysis of 363 photographs as- Lutz, Jane L. Collins, Martha Sandweiss, Shawn Mi- sembled by W. E. B Du Bois in albums for theAmerican chelle Smith, Joanna Scherer, and Geoffrey Batchen, Negro Exhibit at the Paris exposition in 1900, contem- among others, inform my views.o porary understanding of historical photographs proves Always keep in mind this fundamental practice: Nev- difFrcult. Their social and cultural significance, while er assume photographs are a literal illustration of what self-evident to viewers of the origir rl era, has been they represent. In other words, recall the specific context obscured by the passage of time, pl ce, and shifting of the photograph's production and the.audience who cultural conditions. Researchers neces: rily reconstruct consumes it (for whatever purpose). As Barthes re- the photograph is "not only perceived, received, the circumstances of the photograph's t 'rei and produc- flected, tion in order to "make the image compr! hensible again it is read, connected more or less consciously by the for a contemporary audience, to recover their lost mean- public that consumes it to a tradition stock of signs . ing, and to revitalize them," and, in the case of the gesfures, attitudes, expressions, colors or effects, en- Georgia albums analyzed, by Smith, to make Du Bois's dowed with certain meanings by virtue of the practice race-based cultural criticism intelligible.' Du Bois's of a certain society."s While the photograph is indexical hand in assembling the images in the album was pur- to an identifiable subject/thing/place or person in the poseful, Smith proposed, serving as an effective counter world, it is also a portable and infinitely reproducible archive to the oppressive classificatory race taxonomies artifact. Thus the photograph is much more than mere of his time. referent because it is interpreted, consumed, and circu- Thus, without careful interpretation, photctraphic lated by viewers in a particular time, place, and within a sources, like diarie can anpear superficial or s etchy. specific cultural framework of looking. The historical This essay offers rpretrve guidelines for hist'rians researcher or student reconstructs this situated knowl- who 'vant to use photographs more effectively a: ori- edge of the spectator for the purposing of reconnecting mary s .ces i,. *heir teaching and research. Initially 'ne the historical photograph to the web of social, cultural, must spend extended time studying all within the fn re and political relations within which it was produced, in- of the photograph, and, subsequently, learn to trust yc, " terpreted, and distributed. Moreover, the historian takes trained eye in detecting what the photograph has to offe, into account how captions, or any other text placed in A series of basic questions might be pursued in order t<; close proximity, endeavors to fix or stabilize meaning on assemble a dossier of information about the photograph behalf of the photograph. Captions often infuse the that reveals deeper significance. The basic questions photograph with meanings unanticipated by the photog- include: rapher or subject.6 Who is looking? Photographs metaphorically represent much more i 3- lllustration: llLuminations of the Photographic "Frontier" 30 Jow, Spring 2007, Vol. 46, No. 2 Williams: Beyond - context of the nineteenth-century colonial Pacific Northwest, for example, the Anglo or Euro American photographer increasingly held greater sociopolitical po*". within the urban setting than did a female Coast Salish woman, the subject of the photograph to the left. This woman, on the other hand, may have offered her service as a photographic subject for a nominal fee, either in barter or monetary form, thus entering a commercial transaction with the studio photographer. As the commercial value of photographs of North Ameri- can Indians escalated in harmony with the gathering presence and force of tourism and, by century's end, with professionals associated with anthropology, the commercial photographer became, in some sense, in- debted to the willing Native participant, in this case a female sitter. Like the itinerant field photographer, commercial studio photographers sought any and all profitable subjects to harness for the camera and the marketplace. The rise in popularity of Indian portraits thus profited a range of consumers, including commer- cial photographers, anthropologists, museum collectors, .and tourists. In sum, the motive for the taking of the photograph becomes viable historical evidence to expose the eco- nomic and social identities of two individuals: the pho- tographer and sitter. Yet, by the time the photographic artifact falls into the purview of later researchers or students, the social motives that brought the photograph 1: Hannah Maynard (British, active 1862-1913)"'Studio por- Figure existence may have been detached or lost. The orig- trait of unidentified Coast Salish womanl'no daie. into British Columbia Archives, Call #F-08915 inal individual interests involved must be reestablished to revive the motives for, and functions of, the photo- the photograph serves than what is depicted within the confines of the frame. graph. In the case of portraiture, encounter occurred between the The photograph (and portraiture in particular) manifests as evidence that a social an individual or individuals' It also an actual social encounter when two or more people met photographer and some form, monetary or the photographer stood behind the shutter' and the represents an exchange of -. between the subject and pho- subject posed in front of the lens. Prior to the shutter otherwise, that transpired lacked explicit per- movement, moreover, the participants negotiated the tographer, unless the photographer case in colonial settings and terms of the photographic event in some manner. As mission (frequently the observed in Framing the West, photographs might there- early ethnograPhY.) the Coast Salish woman fore be understood to represent a social "frontier'"t In this particular portrait, negotiation with a Portraiture, landscape, and portraits I termed "Indian willingly entered a commercial for income' Indeed, as a life" were distinct genres, all bearing significance in studio photographer, probably a seller of clams, she perhaps generating a visual narrative of colonization and settle- street-based entrepreneur, an Indian accrued com- ment of the American West. While each has defining recognized that her image as Hannah Maynard, on her characteristics, students should be taught to interpret mercial value. Photographer commitment to her business, none in isolation. part, had shown enduring her sitter, the commercial The portrait photograph often embodies a "frontier" recognizing, in accord with women as well as North of uneven relations of power; a meeting between people poteitial Jf portraiture of as the primary entre- of varying social status or divergent interests. Drawing American Indians.n She worked studio in Victoria, on Foucauldian concepts of power, W. J. T. Mitchell preneur of a successful commercial the San Juan Islands, for remarked that "the 'taking' of human subjects by a british Columbia, north of years. might also have thought photographer (or a writer) is a concrete social encounter, more than fifty Maynard seller suited a particular often between a damaged, victimized; and powerless that this image of the clam civic offi- individual and a relatively privileged observer, often client (tourist, Indian agent, anthropologist, etc.) to whom she could subse- acting as the 'eye of power,' the agent of some social' cial, museum collector, political or journalistic institution."s Within the social quentlY market it. T I " JOW, Spring 2007, Vol. 46, No. 2 31 I Williams; Beyond lllustation : Illuminations oJ' the Photo graphi' !-y'"' - I I l I I I I .Davis Barkerville:' British cotumbia Archives, cail #4-00558 Figure 2: Frederick Dally (active
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